At least the Labour Party won't be remembered and blamed for the savage cuts in public expenditure that will be happening in the immediate and foreseeable future. I wonder whether the Liberal Democrats will turn a blind eye to, or even help to implement, the truly wicked welfare reform agenda that Cameron and his crew are keen to unleash on the United Kingdom in return for some cabinet seats?

The only thing any of us can do now is to try to survive and wait for the world to turn...

The only movement on electoral reform under this coalition will be AV, which is nothing. In fact, AV will make real electoral reform in the form of STV even more of a distant dream than it ever was.

The Lib Dems are finished. All those youngsters caught up in the excitement of Cleggmania? They were the next generation of Lib Dem voters. The party membership? I know of three LDs who are tearing up their membership cards right now and who tell me that half the party are likely to be doing the same. They are about to become a footnote of British political history.

the "New" Politics - fixed term of 5 years... 55% for recall... £10k tax break to middle classes - nothing to the poor (was to be paid for by taxing the higher earners - but Tories trunmped Libs on that); Lib Dems cannot vote against contentious tory legislation (elected members chained!); 2/3 of the cabinet millionaire public school educated; STV or any fair system of election gone for at least a generation... amnesty for corporations who have not paid corp tax when they were supposed to... but Cleggy and Cammy are pals... Gleichschaltung

Penny Red is...

Laurie Penny, 25, journalist, author, feminist, socialist, utopian, general reprobate and troublemaker. Lives in a little hovel room somewhere in London, mainly eating toast and trying to set the world to rights. Drinks too much tea. Has still not managed to quit smoking. Regular writer for New Statesman, The Guardian and The Independent. Author of Meat Market (Zer0 Books, April 2011) and Penny Red (Pluto Press, October 2011).

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